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P02 / Online book / Part 01

Historical field / c. 4th century BCE—present

A Map of Economics

Read from top to bottom. The vertical direction marks historical sequence; the parallel rails follow recurring intellectual cores. The map records conceptual continuities, not a claim that every later thinker was directly influenced by every earlier one.

Six recurring lines of inquiry

  1. CAPProduction & distribution
  2. EQChoice & equilibrium
  3. MACMoney & macro
  4. INSTInstitutions & information
  5. BEHBehavior & evidence
  6. EVOInnovation & evolution
  1. 00c. 4th century BCE—16th century

    The ethical and political prehistory of economic thought

    Wealth, exchange, money, taxation, and household rule were still questions inside ethics, law, and statecraft.

    Other turning points

    Xenophon · Scholastic just-price theory · Ibn Khaldun

    INST

    384—322 BCE

    Aristotle

    亚里士多德

    Provision, exchange, and the boundary between use and accumulation.

    Politics, Book I

    Planned
  2. 011700—1776

    Political economy becomes a system

    The economy begins to appear as an interconnected circulation of production, income, prices, trade, and population.

    Other turning points

    Hume · Quesnay and the Tableau économique · Turgot

    EVO

    c. 1680s—1734

    Richard Cantillon

    理查德·坎蒂隆

    Entrepreneurship, uncertainty, and the circulation of an interdependent economy.

    Essay on the Nature of Trade in General

    Planned

    CAP

    1723—1790

    Adam Smith

    亚当·斯密

    Division of labor, exchange, institutions, and commercial society.

    The Theory of Moral Sentiments

    Planned
  3. 021776—1867

    Classical political economy and its critique

    Production, value, class distribution, accumulation, trade, and the historical character of capitalism move to the center.

    Other turning points

    Malthus · Say · J. S. Mill · List

    CAP

    1772—1823

    David Ricardo

    大卫·李嘉图

    Distribution, rent, relative costs, and comparative advantage.

    On the Principles of Political Economy and Taxation

    Planned

    CAP

    1818—1883

    Karl Marx

    卡尔·马克思

    Surplus value, capital accumulation, class, and technological change.

    Capital, Volume I

    Planned
  4. 031871—1914

    The marginal revolution and neoclassical consolidation

    The unit of analysis shifts from social classes and surplus toward individual choice, scarcity, marginal trade-offs, and equilibrium.

    Other turning points

    Jevons · Walras · Edgeworth · Pareto

    EQ

    1840—1921

    Carl Menger

    卡尔·门格尔

    Subjective value, marginal utility, and spontaneously evolved institutions.

    Principles of Economics

    Planned

    EQ

    1842—1924

    Alfred Marshall

    阿尔弗雷德·马歇尔

    Supply, demand, elasticity, time, and partial equilibrium.

    Principles of Economics

    Planned
  5. 041890—1945

    Money, cycles, knowledge, and the macroeconomic rupture

    Credit, expectations, uncertainty, unemployment, entrepreneurship, and coordination challenge the image of frictionless equilibrium.

    Other turning points

    Wicksell · Fisher · Veblen · Schumpeter · Kalecki

    MAC

    1883—1946

    John Maynard Keynes

    约翰·梅纳德·凯恩斯

    Uncertainty, effective demand, and persistent involuntary unemployment.

    The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money

    Planned

    INST

    1899—1992

    F. A. Hayek

    弗里德里希·哈耶克

    Dispersed knowledge, price signals, and spontaneous order.

    The Use of Knowledge in Society

    Planned
  6. 051930—1970

    Formalization and the postwar synthesis

    Economics becomes more mathematical and econometric while general equilibrium, growth, strategic interaction, and policy are rebuilt in formal models.

    Other turning points

    Frisch · Tinbergen · Haavelmo · Arrow–Debreu · Nash · Solow

    INST

    1910—2013

    Ronald Coase

    罗纳德·科斯

    Transaction costs, property rights, and institutional choice.

    The Nature of the Firm

    Planned

    EQ

    1915—2009

    Paul Samuelson

    保罗·萨缪尔森

    Optimization, comparative statics, and the neoclassical synthesis.

    Foundations of Economic Analysis

    Planned

    MAC

    1912—2006

    Milton Friedman

    米尔顿·弗里德曼

    Money, permanent income, expectations, and policy rules.

    A Monetary History of the United States

    Planned
  7. 061970—2000

    Information, behavior, contracts, and institutions

    Private information, cognitive limits, transaction costs, governance rules, and mechanism design move inside the analytical core.

    Other turning points

    Spence · Stiglitz · Williamson · Thaler · Hurwicz–Maskin–Myerson

    INST

    1940—

    George Akerlof

    乔治·阿克洛夫

    Asymmetric information, adverse selection, and fragile markets.

    The Market for Lemons

    Planned

    BEH

    1934—2024

    Daniel Kahneman

    丹尼尔·卡尼曼

    Judgment, framing, reference points, and loss aversion.

    Prospect Theory

    Planned

    INST

    1933—2012

    Elinor Ostrom

    埃莉诺·奥斯特罗姆

    Commons, durable rules, and polycentric self-governance.

    Governing the Commons

    Planned
  8. 071980—present

    Endogenous growth, causal evidence, and complex adaptive economies

    Ideas, technology, institutions, heterogeneity, experiments, causal identification, path dependence, and emergence define an expanding contemporary toolkit.

    Other turning points

    Lucas · Aghion–Howitt · Card–Angrist–Imbens · Duflo · Acemoglu

    EVO

    1946—

    W. Brian Arthur

    威廉·布莱恩·阿瑟

    Increasing returns, path dependence, learning, and emergence.

    Increasing Returns and Path Dependence

    Planned

    EVO

    1955—

    Paul Romer

    保罗·罗默

    Ideas, knowledge spillovers, increasing returns, and endogenous growth.

    Endogenous Technological Change

    Planned